Through the Looking Glass
Happy New Year
When interviewing prospective landscape architecture students, there is much to be said for starting with the question, ‘How did you get here?’ If, as must often be the case, the answer is ‘I came by train’, the supplementary would be, ‘And what did you do while you were on the train?’. The interviewer is, of course, fishing for at least part of the answer to be, ‘I looked out of the window’. Who wants to train a landscape designer with no visual curiosity?
Some might say that looking at the world through glass is too conventional, too much of a cliché and makes it too easy to ‘edit’ the view to create a safe, blinkered or fictional perspective. Terroir disagrees of course. We have found that looking through a frame can stimulate a new way of seeing the view, create a window on history or a reflective mood, or a new frame of mind. All puns intended.
Below, Terroir presents a backward glance at some of our favourite window views from 2023. Looking forward, we wish all our followers a healthy and happy New Year. And please, keep looking out of the window.
Above: same window, different days, different messages, different emotions. Near Clitheroe, Lancashire.
Below: ruination (left) and new life (right). Morriston, Swansea.
Above: the straight lines of the city from the top (of the Calgary Tower) and
Below: curving lines of the city from the ground (left - reflecting in Monte Carlo, and right - relaxing in London)
Above: Mind the gap - views from the bridge. Left: the Chicago River Right: London Blackfriars
Above left: New Mexico through a shop window. Above right: Alberta through the rear window
Above - Texas through the plane window. Left - irrigation; right - oil.
Above: the view of the artist.
Below: a view of history.
